They Once Were Equally Haunting

Perhaps we should call it folkloric evolution. Or maybe we ought to see it as a spontaneous paranormal makeover. But whatever term we use, it’s clear that fairies are viewed far differently today than they were hundreds of years ago. Back then, they weren’t always radiant, or even particularly friendly; in fact, in some places they were associated with graveyards, and the dead.

In his book The Haunted: A Social History of Ghosts, author Owen Davies tells us that as late as the 1800s, especially in Scotland but perhaps also in a few other areas of Britain, there was frequent confusion concerning what was a fairy, and what was a ghost. Both “were considered by some to be departed spirits who lingered on the earth.” [Read more…] about GHOSTS AND FAIRIES

A Shroud, By Any Other Name

Why does a person “dress up” as a ghost by cutting eye-holes in a bed sheet and then draping that sheet over his or her head? Does a traditional ghost really wear sheets?

Well, people in the English-speaking world have been “doing” ghosts in just this way for hundreds of years, and there is a good reason for it. In Britain, until relatively recently, a wooden coffin was a post-mortem luxury that was far too expensive for many people. In fact, only the relatively well-to-do could afford coffins in which to bury the remains of their departed loved ones. That meant that the corpses of poor people—and there were a lot of those—had to go coffinless. [Read more…] about WHY DO GHOSTS WEAR SHEETS?

Ghosts vs. Aliens vs. God: Ghosts Win!

Elsewhere on this site we have ascertained that Britain is the most haunted nation on earth, hosting approximately one ghost per square mile, according to British experts on such matters. And according to a new survey conducted by Ripley’s Believe It or Not, the Brits themselves are every bit as haunted as their castles and their countryside: More British adults believe in ghosts than believe in God.

Ripley’s survey of 1,500 Britons, published on October 28, 2014, revealed that 55 percent believe in ghosts, as opposed to only 25 percent who believe in God. Other supernatural beings included in the survey were aliens (51 percent), UFOs (42 percent), and angels (27 percent). [Read more…] about BRITISH BELIEF IN GHOSTS

What Are Seances?

Quite simply, a seance, or séance, is an attempt to communicate with the dead, something people have been trying for thousands of years. In Homer’s epic Greek poem, the Odyssey, written nearly 3,000 years ago, the hero, Odysseus, spills the blood of a bull near the entrance to Hades in order to lure out the shades of the dead, several of whom he wishes to speak to. And in the Old Testament of the bible (Samuel 28:7-20), King Saul asks the Witch of Endor to summon the spirit of the prophet, Samuel, in order to ask him about the outcome of an upcoming battle.

Throughout most of history the vast majority of people have been afraid of ghosts, and contacting ghosts intentionally was usually the furthest thing from anyone’s mind. However, this attitude changed a bit in the mid-1800s with the rise of the Spiritualist movement. Spiritualists believe that not only is contact with the dead possible, but that it can also be beneficial, with spirits including those of departed friends, loved ones, and historical figures providing comfort and even practical advice. It was during the early days of Spiritualism that that the term “seance”—French for sitting together or gathering—came into popular use in the U.S. and Britain. [Read more…] about WHAT IS A SEANCE?

Which Country Has The Most Ghosts?

Britain, the nation that invented both the gothic ghost story and the eccentric pastime of ghost hunting, is the world’s most haunted country, with more ghosts per square mile than anywhere else on earth. This of course is not a provable assertion, but the Brits themselves are sure of it.

In the Introduction to his 2007 book, The Haunted: A Social History of Ghosts, writer and academic Owen Davies tells us that in the 1940’s a folklorist in Warwickshire “calculated that there was one ghost to the square mile in his district.” According to Davies, if we assume the same density of disembodied spirits throughout all of England, we’d come of up with a ghostly population of around 50,000. And of course Scotland’s lonely expanses—the setting for Shakespeare’s Macbeth—are no less haunted than England.

“There are more ghosts seen, reported, and accepted in the British Isles than anywhere else on earth,” declares noted British ghost hunter Peter Underwood in his 1971 book, A Gazetteer of British Ghosts. [Read more…] about WORLD’S MOST HAUNTED COUNTRY

Every April The Train Ghosts Through Albany

Following Abraham Lincoln’s 1865 assassination, two coffins—one containing the president’s body and the other bearing the exhumed remains of his young son, Willie, who had died in the White House—were placed on a train pulled by a steam locomotive for transport back to the Lincolns’ home state of Illinois, where they would be buried. All along the route from Washington to Illinois, people lined the tracks to bid farewell to the president who had fought and won the Civil War.

The funeral train was made up of nine cars. The ninth car, which had been built to take the living president and his family on rail trips, was the one in which Lincoln and Willie were carried. [Read more…] about ABRAHAM LINCOLN’S GHOST TRAIN